Is Big Brother keeping track of what you eat and whom you eat with?

Made a lunch date one day last week with some friends who live in Orinda and said they were planning to be downtown the next day. I used Open Table (although I haven’t registered for it, so they don’t have any information about me but my e-mail address) to make a reservation for four at noon. It was in my name, and of course, I gave no other name in our party.

Shortly thereafter, when I received an e-mail confirmation from Open Table, I forwarded it to my friends, so they’d know this was all confirmed, and the exact location and time of our date.

And about an hour before the reservation time, the friends received a Google message saying they’d better leave Orinda right then if they were going to get there on time. Not only is Big Brother watching, but he’s also nagging.

Other dining notes:

•Betsy Nolan noticed Gordon Kelsey of El Cerrito’s response to food journalist Corby Kummer’s recent Vanity Fair essay about the pretentious overuse of the term “farm-to-table.” “Living as we do, so close to Chez Panisse and Berkeley’s Gourmet Ghetto,” wrote Kelsey in a just-published letter to the magazine’s editor, “we are always delighted to impress our dinner guests with the news that their meal is ‘locally sourced.’ We have a Trader Joe’s, Safeway and Costco all within a mile.”

•Delicious meal in a handsome new restaurant a few weeks ago. But ... corn ice cream?

Google is watching you, Google is nagging your friends

•Lawyer and historian John Briscoe put together the deal — with Mark Buell, George Miller and Sam’s Grill owner Peter Quartaroli — that just opened the Sam’s Seafood Alley adjacent to 148-year-old Sam’s Grill, at Bush and Belden Alley. Wednesday night’s celebration of this celebrated oysters particularly and history in general. “San Francisco is the youngest major city in the United States,” said Briscoe. Which makes it more remarkable that “Sam’s Grill is the fifth oldest continuously operating restaurant in the United States.” (Tadich Grill is third, but we weren’t there to celebrate the competition.)

The opening event included a lot of drinking up and a lot of looking down. The patio is the only one in the line of seven restaurants in the alley with a real floor — the other tables and chairs are on the street — which is cleverly hinged, to enable it to be folded every night against the side of the traditional Sam’s. Briscoe said that after the design and portable kitchen got the going over and approvals from the city’s health and fire departments, representatives of each called to ask about making arrangements to have department Christmas parties there.

•At a street corner in Berkeley, Dan Wohlfeiler yelled, “Put down your phone” at a passing driver of a convertible who seemed immersed in a cell phone conversation. The driver yelled back, “Sorry, I can’t hear you. I’m on my phone.”

•Laughter broke out in the waiting room at the San Francisco Kaiser injury clinic, reports Karen Horton, when a medical assistant told a patient needing an X-ray at the adjacent department, “I’ll meet you on the other side.” “Well, not that other side,” the assistant added, in response to the laughter, “and certainly not today.”

And in related news, Annie Lamott on Facebook: “Other people, like obviously Jimmy Carter, handle fearful news with faith and elegance, while you KNOW that you will be more like a cross between Kylie Jenner and Ed Grimley.”

•As to the DUI arrest of Cardinal William Levada in Hawaii last week, Tom Ammiano refers to the similar arrest of Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone three years ago in San Diego. They both ought to pray “to St. Uber before they get behind the wheel again,” says Ammiano.

•Food for thought: If we do manage to clean up the streets of all stinky substances — as so many of my colleagues have so passionately advocated — won’t that deprive the canine citizenry of the joy of sniffing?

Today’s drought tip comes from Julian Grant: “Time your shower while listening to your favorite pop song.” Most of them last for about 2½ minutes. Do not choose “In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida,” which lasts for 17 minutes, even if liking that song probably means you’re old enough to have lots of crevices and crannies to scrub clean.

Leah Garchik washed up on the shores of Fifth and Mission in 1972, began her duties as a part-time temporary steno clerk, and ascended the journalistic ladder. Over the years, she has served as writer, reviewer, editor and columnist. She is the author of two books, “San Francisco: Its Sights and Secrets” and “Real Life Romance."

She is an avid knitter, a terrible accordion player, a sporadic tweeter and a pretty good speller.